LOS ANGELES — The former host of Animal Planet's "Wild Recon" show has been charged in Los Angeles with selling two endangered Iranian desert monitor lizards without a permit.

City News Service says Donald Schultz, a herpetologist based in Southern California, was charged Thursday with violating the federal Endangered Species Act. If convicted, he could face up to a year in jail and a $100,000 fine.

A message left for Schultz on his Facebook page wasn't immediately returned Friday.

Authorities say Schultz sold the rare lizards for $2,500 to an undercover federal wildlife agent who answered his 2010 offer on Facebook.

On his now-canceled show, Schultz would parachute into remote locations to take biological samples from deadly snakes and other dangerous animals.

I knew about this a while back from a friend who got screwed over by this. I'm glad to see Donald get charged.

Donald deserves EVERY punishment coming to him. He put good friends into this mess without them knowing what was going on. While the desert monitors aren't ethically an issue (CB animals), he just failed to get a USDI ESA permit to transfer across state lines on them. What IS an issue is the trafficking of South African species he was engaged in (he did SOME legal trade in them as well). A few other things that USFWS hasn't caught wind of, and I hope they do. The stories I know....